Friends old and new

It always happens, doesn’t it? You think you want something and then when you get it, you don’t want it anymore. Not that I am ever happy to see the end of summer, but one thing that I thought I was looking forward to was not wearing shorts and a t-shirt every darn day. And then I woke up this morning, a sunny Saturday with temperatures in the 40s (in SEPTEMBER!) and I put on jeans and a top and a sweater, and I felt like I’d been stuffed into a straitjacket, bound up like a mummy in clothes that restricted my freedom of movement in a way that I am no longer accustomed to. 

It’s later in the day now, and a little warmer than this morning. It’s not t-shirt and shorts warmer but with leggings, a short-sleeved t-shirt, and a ¼ zip pullover thing, I am quite comfortable. I’m going to walk with my friend. More writing later. 

*****

It’s Sunday morning now, November cold but brilliantly sunny, almost blinding. I walked with my friend and her dog yesterday. My friend is younger and more energetic than I am, and her dog is more energetic than either of us. I like walking with them, because they make me walk faster and farther than I would on my own. We walk together pretty often, and we usually resume our ongoing conversation from whatever point we left off at the end of the last walk. We talk about work, or books and movies and politics, or family. Yesterday, my friend told me that she’d spoken to her mother a few days earlier. “We had lunch at Panera today,” her mother told her. “It was a treat, but quite a bit more food than we expected, so we’re just going to have a snack for dinner.” 

“There it is,” my friend said. “My parents are an insurance commercial.” 

*****

I don’t think much about what I wear when I’m with my close friends. They’re my friends. They know me. They know what I look like. But when I see newer friends, I take more trouble with my clothes and overall appearance. Earlier in the day on Saturday, I had an appointment with a church acquaintance. We work together in a volunteer group that helps new mothers in need, and we were to meet a new client together. So I wanted to look nice, to make a good first impression. This woman is stylish, in an affluent outdoorsy suburban woman way, and she always looks well-dressed and put-together, and I wanted to look well-dressed and put-together too. Or rather, I wanted her to think of me as well-dressed and well put-together. 

*****

Back in late July and early August, I started searching for a barn jacket. Something or someone put me in mind of a barn jacket, like the J. Crew ones that were so popular in the early ‘90s. I have no idea if they’re making a comeback or not, or if this was just one of my short-lived style whims. I looked high and low for exactly the right barn jacket. I couldn’t decide between vintage or new, between red or a dark tan, between canvas with a leather or corduroy collar or lightweight quilted nylon. Eventually, I lost interest because after all, it was still summer and I don’t like thinking about fall clothes in the summer; and because really, I’m not a barn jacket person. I don’t have a barn. I like going outside, but I’m not outdoorsy. I have never been on a horse in my entire life and God willing, I never will be. Nothing against horses, of course. They’re beautiful creatures. I just don’t want to go anywhere near one. I finally got a nice insulated canvas utility jacket with patch pockets and a hood; and I hung it in my closet thinking that I’d get to wear it sometime late in October. And then it was 45 degrees on a Saturday morning in the middle of September and I was glad that I had that jacket. 

*****

Back to my church friend. I’ve known her to say hello to, as my mother always said, for a few years, but we have never really interacted other than to greet one another at church or at kids’ sports practices (our sons ran cross-country together a long time ago). She called me a little while before we were to meet, to let me know that she was running late, and as I listened to her voice, I realized that I didn’t know her at all. I didn’t recognize her telephone voice right away, and her speech patterns and conversational style were not familiar to me. As we spoke, I wondered if we’ll remain friendly acquaintances, or if we’ll eventually become friends.

****

While we’re on the topic of jackets, is there really that much of a difference between a barn jacket and a utility jacket? In terms of function, not so much. Both are generally boxy or relaxed fit canvas jackets, with plenty of spacious pockets to warm your hands or hold your things. Both generally come in rather muted, drab colors. They might be insulated or not. Appearances aside, though, there’s a philosophical difference between a utility jacket and a barn jacket. They say different things about the wearer. The utility jacket is city mouse, and the barn jacket is its country cousin. The utility jacket goes to the museum or to Starbucks, and the barn jacket goes to the stables or to a fall festival. They might have different taste in movies. They might be on opposite political sides. 

*****

My church friend and I finished our task, and we spent a few minutes chatting before continuing on with our day.  We ended up talking about politics (more and more my least favorite subject) and I learned that she is a reluctant but unwavering Trump supporter, because she believes that he is the better option for pro-life voters. I disagree vehemently, but I understand her position. She’s not enthusiastic about Trump, and I’m not enthusiastic about Biden, but on November 3, we’re going to cancel out one another’s votes. 

I’m reading back over this now, and I think that I intended the jackets to serve as a metaphor. One jacket is an acquaintance, and the other is a friend. They don’t look that different until you really start to examine them closely. And it’s not a bad metaphor, is it?  A person might need a barn jacket AND a utility jacket. It depends on the occasion. And a person needs friends and acquaintances. I still don’t know if my church friend and I are going to be real friends or not, but I have not ruled it out and I don’t think she has either. That’s a good sign, I think. Some of us are still willing to reach across the ever-widening political divide to make a friend on the other side. It's not a bad idea to try on a different jacket now and then. 

I can't with this

It’s Friday, May 29 and I’m as angry about politics as I have ever been in my life, if by “politics” I mean the simple ability of politicians and their enablers to tell the difference between right and wrong. The worst thing is that it's entirely possible, even likely, that Donald J. Trump will win another term in November. By "win another term," of course, I mean "do whatever he needs to do up to and including theft, fraud, and murder to hang onto power." Hopefully, the Democrats (who are only marginally better) will take the House and Senate and remove him from office. If using social media to incite gun violence in American cities does not make him unfit for office, then I guess I don't really understand the Constitution.

The Minneapolis police finally arrested the cop who murdered poor George Floyd, who begged for help and cried for his mother, while a merciless thug masquerading as a law enforcement officer held him down, using his knee and the full weight of his body to choke the life out of a man accused of nothing more than passing a bad check. How much pain and terror must a grown man suffer to cry for his mother in front of his tormentors?

By the way, I am actually pro-life. Meaning against abortion, opposed to the death penalty in all circumstances,
opposed to assisted suicide, opposed to refusing refuge to desperate people whose lives are in danger
 and DEFINITELY opposed to mowing people down with machine guns for breaking fucking windows at Target. 

The President who earlier today demanded the death penalty for looters didn’t demand the death penalty for the man who murdered George Floyd. He didn’t call for the death penalty for the Charlottesville white supremacists who murdered Heather Heyer. He didn’t demand swift, deadly justice for the people who murdered Ahmaud Arbery, or Botham Jean, or Atatiana Jefferson, God rest their souls.

My husband is a police officer who had to leave the house in uniform this morning, so not only am I seething with fury at the outrageous oppression that the Black community continues to suffer; I’m also sick with anxiety and fear.

God help us all.

Bibliography 2019: Heated Mess Edition

It's almost the end of January, and I'm just getting around to posting my book list from 2019. These are listed in no real order. I kept a handwritten list, but as I ran out of room in my planner, I scrawled titles in margins and between lines. By the end of the year, I couldn't remember when I had read what book, so chronological order was out of the question. Then I started to rank the books, from favorite to least, but I grew tired of rearranging the list as I remembered more books, or changed my mind about one book or another. So this is a very disorganized list.

Oh, and another thing. I wrote about almost all of these books soon after I read them, and I link the original posts here. But most of the original posts are not only about the books. If you click on a title to read about a book, you might have to dig through 600 or so words about swim meets and handbags and anxiety attacks and Mary Tyler Moore reruns first. Don't say you weren't warned.

Without further ado, here is my 2019 book list.

Milkman, Anna Burns. This was my favorite book of the year, and I read some pretty darn good books in 2019. So congratulations to Anna Burns for winning the prestigious honor of a mention in this obscure blog, my everlasting esteem, and absolutely no cash whatsoever. Well done. I wrote about Milkman here, and I'll be writing about it again. If you have read any reviews of Milkman, then you might think that it's a difficult read. It's not at all difficult, though it is different from any other novel I've ever read. Comparisons to Joyce are apt, but it's much more closely akin to Dubliners than to Finnegan's Wake or Ulysses. Like Dubliners, it's a book that could take place in no city other than the one in which it is set. And like Dubliners, it's a book that only an Irish person could have written.

Say Nothing, Patrick Radden Keefe. A very close second to Milkman, and something of a companion piece. Another of the few books that I dedicated an entire post to.

Thatcher, Jacob Bannister. The very opposite of an in-depth biography; and completely appropriate for my level of interest in Margaret Thatcher, which is low. I read it right after Say Nothing, and learned almost nothing about the British perspective on the Troubles. I did learn that Margaret Thatcher began her working life as a chemist. Maybe she should have stuck with science. I don't know. I don't even want to debate American politics in 2020, let alone British politics in 1982. Anyway, there's lots more to learn about Margaret Thatcher, but this will probably represent the extent of my reading on this particular subject.

The Woman in White, Willkie Collins. I would never have chosen this. I read it because Nora Ephron liked it. She was quite right.

Heartburn, Nora Ephron. A book about everything that was wrong with the 1970s and early 1980s, disguised as a comic novel about the breakup of a marriage. Not Nora's best.

I Remember Nothing, Nora Ephron. If you have a choice between Nora in novel form and Nora in essay form, choose the latter. I never tire of reading Nora Ephron's essays.

I Feel Bad About My Neck, Nora Ephron.  Yes, it was my year of Nora Ephron. Handbags and hospitals and strudel with noodles.

My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Ottessa Moshfegh. I couldn't tell at first if it was brilliant or lazy. I lean strongly in favor of brilliant now, but I still have some reservations. I might read it again. But then again, I might not.

The Abolition of Woman, Fiorella Nash. I wrote about this one way back in January (it seems so long ago), but if you don't feel like reading what I wrote then (what?!?) then I will leave you with this quote: "It is the fatally disastrous blind spot in current human rights campaigning, the failure to acknowledge the rights of every member of the human family, but prolife feminism represents a human rights movement which excludes no human life under any circumstances." People on both sides of the political divide might do well to note the emphasis (which is mine).

Resisting Throwaway Culture, Charles Camosy. A+ for ideas, C+ for execution. When I started writing this, I had execution at a B-, but I just knocked off a few points because I'm mean.

Becoming, Michelle Obama. This was a Christmas gift from my husband--Christmas 2018, that is. I read it early in the year. I was carrying it with me one day and a young black man stopped me and asked me if it was good. I told him that it was, and I told him that Mrs. Obama had an upbringing (working class, inner city, magnet high school) similar to mine. And then we commiserated about how much we missed President Obama, and even President Bush. It was a nice conversation.

Elizabeth the Queen, Sally Bedell Smith. Poor QE II. 2019 was not such a good year 2020 isn't off to a great start either.

Motherfocloir: Dispatches from a Not-So-Dead Language. Darach O'Seaghdha. Just remembering how to spell the author's last name without having to refer back to the other browser tab makes me unwilling to even think about tackling the Irish language. I have no talent for languages other than my own.

The Madwoman in the Volvo, Sandra Tsing-Loh. I had a book of Sandra Tsing-Loh's essays, written sometime in the early 90s, and I remember re-reading it several times. She was hilarious, like a manic Asian Merrill Markoe. The Madwoman in the Volvo was just sad. It made me sad, mostly because I found myself judging the author, and pretty harshly, for her selfishness and stupidity. And who am I to judge anyone for either of those sins? I'm just as bad as everyone else. Maybe it's because she seemed to feel entitled to be selfish, that her suffering was more acute and terrible than everyone else's. Or maybe I'm just an unsympathetic jerk. Probably that.

The Opposite of Fate, Amy Tan. I didn't deliberately set out to find an Asian antidote to Sandra Tsing-Loh, but there it is.

Making Comics, Lynda Barry. This was the last book that I finished in 2019. I bought it at the National Gallery of Art's amazing bookstore. I didn't buy it to read; just to have and to look at, because it's so beautiful. It's printed and bound like a marble composition book, and every inch of every thin, delicate page is covered with gorgeous, richly colored drawings and hand-lettered text. Then I started reading it, and I couldn't stop until I finished. And then I went immediately out and bought my own made-in-Vietnam marble composition book. I'm not going to make comics, and I'm not going to draw every day either, but I think I'll write by hand sometimes now. Or maybe I'll doodle to better purpose.

The Little Friend, Donna Tartt. This counts as both my first book of 2020 and my last book of 2019. I finished it on January 2. I'd have finished it sooner except for the temporary Lynda Barry detour. Like all three of Donna Tartt's novels (the other two are The Secret History, which I read in hardback when it first came out in 1992; and The Goldfinch, which I read in 2015 or so, I think). The Little Friend was published in 2002, and I don't know why it took me so long to read it. The electronic version was on sale a few months ago, so I bought it and finally got around to reading it in December.

As a southern female writer, Donna Tartt is probably often compared to Flannery O'Connor. I don't know; I don't read much literary criticism now that I'm out of school and don't have to. Neither of her other novels really resemble O'Connor (not just because they don't take place in the American South), but no writer could possibly have imagined The Little Friend without having read and re-read the stories of Flannery O'Connor. The character of Harriet, a furiously angry, brilliant and doughty little girl, determined to resist the influence of her weak mother and her strong but very traditionally feminine grandmother, could not have been written if not for O'Connor's Mary Grace and Hulga and Mary Fortune Pitts and Mrs. Cope's daughter and the child in "A Temple of the Holy Ghost." Gum Ratliff is a direct descendant of Mrs. Greenleaf and the white trash woman in the doctor's office in "Revelation." And Edie Cleve owes her existence to Ruby Turpin and Julian's mother and Mrs. May, and all of Flannery O'Connor's determined, outrage-fueled Southern women fighting losing battles to maintain a system that is rotting from within and under attack from without.

But that's not to say that The Little Friend isn't original, because it is. Though Harriet could not have existed without O'Connor's characters, Flannery O'Connor could not have imagined Harriet exactly as she is in The Little Friend. Harriet's dismay and horror of puberty, which is both hilarious and devastating, could only have been written by a woman who reached adolescence during the mid 1970s, a particularly horrible time for young girls, especially rigidly moral and sensitive girls like Harriet. SPOILER ALERT: You will never find out who murdered Harriet's brother. And it almost doesn't matter because that's not the point. I hope that Donna Tartt will publish something new soon. I might have to re-read The Secret History this year. I'll report back in 2021.

The Girls, Emma Cline. Not quite as good as Milkman or The Little Friend, but very, very good. I'd almost forgotten about it, but then I was at a holiday party with people who had just seen "Once Upon a Time in Hollywood," which prompted my husband to talk about when he read Helter Skelter, which reminded me of The Girls. I read somewhere once that the Manson murders brought about the end of the 60s (or caused the beginning of the 70s). It was a horrifying crime (though no worse than millions of other hideous crimes before and since), but it has had a disproportionate impact on American life and culture. Worth reading.

The Future is History, Masha Gessen. In the words of Sara Bloomfield, "Nazis didn't just fall out of the sky in 1933." Masha Gessen knows that history repeats itself, in Russia and the United States.

Goodbye, Mr. Chips, James Hilton. I loved this book.

The End of the Affair, Graham Greene. I bet Phoebe Waller-Bridge read some Graham Greene, for no reason other than that during season 2 of "Fleabag," I kept thinking about The End of the Affair. Did you watch "Fleabag?" Do you remember the part about the fox? Fleabag and The Priest are sitting in a garden at night, and The Priest panics when he thinks he sees a fox. “They’re after me,” he says. “They’re watching me--they point at me and say 'You. We see you. We’re havin’ you.' I don’t know what they want with me.” I feel exactly the same way about the deer. I’m certain that they know me. I’m sure that they have plans for me, plans that I want no part of. And you know what? I don't think that there's a single mention of foxes or deer in The End of the Affair (nor probably in any other Graham Greene book). But there's plenty of God in both. As Fleabag says to The Priest at the end of the last episode, "It's God, isn't it?" Of course it is. It always is.

21 Stories, Graham Greene. I read this just about a year ago. I never did re-read any of the stories. But I'll definitely read more Graham Greene.

Educated, Tara Westover. One of my best  books of 2019. I think about it whenever I cut myself in the kitchen or bump my head on a table or stub my toe or trip over a carpet.  Every time I injure myself or almost injure myself, I think about how easily a person can really hurt herself and how fragile and ridiculous the human body is. Of course, there's so much more to Educated than the frequent and horrifying injuries that Tara and her siblings suffered while working at their father's junkyard. I've just been a little more accident-prone than usual lately. And it's all about me.

I'll Tell You in Person, Chloe Caldwell. Another memoir by a young American woman. I really can't remember if I read this before or after Educated (after, I think), but I know that I didn't read them back to back. I liked this in spite of myself.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson. Well, it's on my list and I know that I read it, but I didn't write anything about it and I don't really remember anything about it. I don't even remember why I read it. So that's my review. I guess I didn't give a f*ck. Maybe I learned that from reading this book! Well done, Mr. Manson!

I'm Judging You: The Do-Better Manual, Luvvie Ajayi. Neither here nor there. I enjoyed reading it, but I don't recall a single word of it. I looked at what I wrote about it earlier to see if I'd remember something. What I remember is that I was also reading a biography of Muriel Spark at the time, which I never finished. Muriel Spark, who was one of the greatest writers of the 20th century, had to have been more interesting than Martin Stannard made her seem. I'm judging him. Or maybe I'm judging her.

Frances and Bernard, Carlene Bauer. A kind of ridiculous novel that I really liked anyway. I liked it so much that I read the very next book on this list.

Not That Kind of Girl, Carlene Bauer. Kind of an incoherent, roundabout, meandering memoir, which is the best kind; probably the only kind.

The Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis. I've read Screwtape five or six times. A hardcover copy of Screwtape is my standard Confirmation gift because I think that every teenager should read it, though I didn't read it until I was a grown-up. I'll probably read it at least five or six more times, just as a reminder that "the safest road to hell is the gradual one – the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts."

A Day in the Life of a Smiling Woman, Margaret Drabble. This is a short story compilation that I liked very much, though don't ask me for details, because I won't remember anything. Well, I remember something about a beach; a very English, Broadchurch type of beach. That's all. I'd never read any of Margaret Drabble's work before this. I thought I remembered writing something about it so I searched "Drabble," but I was searching the Internet, not just my blog, and I learned that a "Drabble" is apparently a 100-word work of fiction. That seems like a fun challenge, so maybe I'll try to write one. I'll probably read more Margaret Drabble this year, too.

South and West, Joan Didion. I won't even link to the post where I mentioned this because at the time, all I remembered of this was a part where Joan Didion ate a grilled cheese sandwich. I'm not sure how anyone as thin as Joan Didion gets to swan around the place eating grilled cheese sandwiches, but life isn't fair. Joan Didion is not much like Nora Ephron. I think of Nora Ephron as "Nora," but I never think of Joan Didion as anything except Joan Didion. But here's one thing they have in common--I like Joan Didion's essays much better than her fiction.

The Anti-Mary Exposed: Rescuing the Culture from Toxic Femininity, Carrie Gress. I read three pro-life books this year and this was the least convincing and by far the least interesting of the three. I won't suggest that there's no such thing as toxic femininity because of course there is. But Ms. Gress (Dr. Gress, I think) comes across as a woman-hating woman and is thus not an effective defender of the argument against mainstream feminism. I also question her scholarship, for two reasons: 1. She presents Mallory Millett as a credible source, which she is certainly not. 2. She can't even correctly quote Meryl Streep in "The Devil Wears Prada." It was a "lumpy" blue sweater, not  "droopy" one. It was not a "lovely Gap Outlet," it was a "tragic Casual Corner;" and Andie didn't "find" the lumpy blue sweater, she "fished it out of a clearance bin." Although Gress makes some very good points in this book, I can't get past her failure to use the word "cerulean" in her mention of this scene. I get that she was citing the screenplay and not the actual movie but if you're trying to make a case to young, feminist women, then you better get Miranda Priestly right. Cerulean!

By all means, confuse Gap Outlet with Casual Corner.
You know how that thrills me. 

Can You Ever Forgive Me? Lee Israel. I didn't really write about the book when I read it, though I wrote about the movie multiple times. I saw it three times (twice on airplanes) and it made a deep impression. The book was good, too, though not quite so memorable and not something that I would have read at all had I not seen the movie. Can You Ever Forgive Me? was not the last book I read in 2019, but I feel that I should list it last so that we're ending on a note of forgiveness; specifically, you forgiving me for making you read this soggy pile of old gym clothes and wet towels disguised as literary criticism. Well, no one made you read it, so I guess if you're in it this far, you're on your own. But please do forgive me.

This post is--how do you say it? A heated mess.
A mess where heat is applied, so it becomes even more messy. 

OMG, am I done? I'm done! That's it! That's the last book on my barely legible handwritten hot mess of a list, and the end of this even hotter mess of a post! Read (most of) these books, and then maybe you'll forget that you spent 30 minutes of your life reading this trash pile! Or maybe you won't, but that's not my problem, is it?

But really, please do forgive me.

Resisting Throwaway Culture (review)

I just finished Charles Camosy’s Resisting Throwaway Culture, a well-thought-out and well-researched but not particularly well-written defense of the Consistent Life Ethic, or CLE. And when I say “just finished” I mean that I finished it ages ago, but I’m just getting around to finishing a post about it. It’s late in the year and I have a ton of half-finished (not to mention half-baked) book reviews to post, and it’s time to get cracking.

Anyway, if you don’t spend much time hanging around with Catholics, then maybe you have never heard of the CLE, which is a philosophy that recognizes the value of all human life, from conception to death; and advocates for pro-life social policies. This means not just opposition to abortion, but actual care for mothers and babies, no matter their social or legal status. Not just opposition to the death penalty but criminal justice reform so that no life is wasted in a prison system that is designed to destroy, not reform.

Camosy’s philosophy and thought are sharp and clear and true. Before I read this book, I was already convinced about the evil of abortion and torture and the death penalty and mass incarceration. But Camosy made me think a great deal more about consumerism and waste and the commercial food supply and how all of those things contribute to the disrespect for life that has come to dominate Western culture. So I agreed with just about every word of this book, but I didn't enjoy reading it at all. And I had to think for a bit to figure out why.

*****
My 18-year-old son is a freshman in college; and like most college freshmen, he has a ton of writing to do. He digs for citations and looks through his reading to find exactly the right quote to illustrate whatever point he's trying to make, and then he goes through his finished essays with a fine-tooth comb, not so much for writing quality, but to make sure that he’s addressed every requirement in the grading rubric. So many points for the correct number of sources, so many points for correctly formatted in-text citations, so many points for a proper MLA bibliography (including hanging indents); and then as what seems like an afterthought, some points for quality of writing and clarity of thought. The end result is usually a solid B piece of work that meets the requirements and answers the questions, but that isn’t much fun to read.

And therein lies my dislike of this book. It’s not the content, of course, because the author is preaching to the proverbial choir. I’m all in. It’s the presentation.

My first issue is with the CLE initialism itself. The constant references to "the CLE" make me feel like I'm reading a proposal or a Statement of Work (that's SOW to you). It's tiresome. I think it would be tiresome for anyone, but it’s especially tiresome for a person who spends her working life in the Federal alphabet soup of initialisms and acronyms, so many that entire publications are dedicated to interpreting them. I also dislike the didactic writing style, in which each argument is followed by possible objections laid out in Q&A format, with questions of a paragraph or more in length, some so sloppily written that you have to read them a second time. I lost my will to live midway through a few of those questions. Ironic, considering the subject.

Clunky writing aside, though, there's quite a bit of original thought in Resisting Throwaway Culture. If you have time for only one pro-life book this year, then read Fiorella Nash’s Abolition of Woman, a much narrower (abortion-focused), but much better written and more interesting defense of the pro-life position. But if you have time for more than one, then this one is worth reading, too.

I'll tell you the truth and it's up to you to live with it

When I was young, I read Robert K. Massie's Nicholas and Alexandra. Then, partly because I wanted to know more about Tsarist Russia and partly because I liked Massie's writing, I read Peter the Great. I spent a good part of a summer on those two books.

Both books are filled with examples of horrific cruelty and indifference to human suffering, but Peter the Great was especially hair-raising. In the introduction (or maybe the epilogue), Massie wrote something about how 17th century Russia was a time and place of hideous cruelty, exactly like every other time and place before or since. This made a deep impression on me, and I think about it every time I read or hear or see stories of unimaginable human suffering here or anywhere in the world. It's a fallen world. Most of us here in the 21st century industrialized West have escaped the worst of it, but no one gets out of this world without some suffering.

*****

I read Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns when it was published, in 2007. I'd read The Kite Runner, like everyone else in the world, and I wondered if Hosseini's second novel would be as good as his first. And it was. It was better, actually. Maybe I like it better because it's a story about women, and because I find it moving that a man can imagine such a true and beautiful female friendship. But it's also just a really good book. It's filled with lovely writing and believable characters, and it uses but does not exploit the horror of life under Taliban rule--especially for women--to great effect. The reader--or at least this reader--comes away knowing that there but for the grace of God go any of us.

2007 was kind of a long time ago. A lot has changed since then. A lot has happened. Last week, I was looking for something to read, and I found A Thousand Splendid Suns sitting in my Kindle library, just waiting for me, so I read it again. I remembered the basic outline of the story, but I had forgotten a lot of detail and I had actually forgotten how it ended (tragic but happy) so I tore through it pretty quickly--it is a page-turner.

*****
A Thousand Splendid Suns is not as well-known as The Handmaid's Tale, another story about women suffering under a harsh theocracy. I didn't mention to anyone I know that I had been reading A Thousand Splendid Suns, because I was sure that someone would connect the theme of women's suffering and oppression at the hands of authoritarian, religious men to what is happening right now in Missouri and Alabama, and I just can't.

I am a pro-life person. But I don't believe--not for one hot second--that the Alabama legislature has ANY INTEREST AT ALL in protecting life. If they did, the abortion bill that they just passed would be accompanied by legislation ending the death penalty, and welcoming refugees and migrants, and strengthening social service supports for poor families so that women in crisis pregnancies will have reason to hope that bringing their babies into the world is a viable option over aborting them. This latest round of abortion bills has nothing to do with the sanctity of life and everything to do with reinforcing the divisions between right and left. They don't want to end legalized abortion, because then there's nothing left to fight about.

*****
On the other hand (yes, the other hand once again), let's discuss the current Handmaid hysteria over these ridiculous new laws. When I see long Facebook posts about back alleys and coat hangers, with invitations to our desperate sisters in Alabama and Louisiana and Missouri to join us in the civilized blue state world where abortion is still legal and "safe," hashtagged #undergroundrailroad2019, I'm frankly a little embarrassed to be a middle-aged college-educated white lady.

Underground railroad?

REALLY?

It's funny, feminist friends, how you should connect abortion to slavery in this manner. Funny, because the comparison is apt, though not, I suspect, in the way that you intended. Slavery and abortion do, in fact, have something in common--both represent the ultimate triumph of the strong over the weak. After all, what is weaker than an unborn child?

In every society in human history in which the weak are not acknowledged to possess human rights, slavery has been the result. Slavery and genocide. And abortion, like it or not, is genocide.

*****
A Thousand Splendid Suns is a story about a society--Afghanistan under the Taliban--in which the weak are not acknowledged as possessing human rights. The weak, of course, are the women. Lots of feminists would read this book and see parallels to the United States in 2019. And so would I, though not, I suspect, in the way they intended.

You should read the book, so I won't give away too much of the story. Just this part. One of the two female protagonists has two children, a girl and a boy. The woman's husband adores the boy, and he barely tolerates the girl. When food becomes scarce in war-torn Kabul, he forces his wife to place the girl in an orphanage. The woman has absolutely no right to protest or to protect her daughter, and she endures beatings and harassment when she goes to visit the child, because her husband refuses to accompany her, and unaccompanied women are fair game for Taliban thugs.

In a society that valued women, a little girl would be of equal value to a little boy, and a mother would have equal parenting rights with her husband.

Of course, in a society that valued women, a woman who actually wanted--really wanted--to destroy her own child would be a rare and hideously tragic figure, pitied as mentally ill or otherwise terribly damaged. In a society that really treasured life, draconian abortion statutes would not be necessary, because the great majority of women would naturally choose to give birth to their babies, and would naturally expect that their jobs and their families and their schools and their communities would do whatever was necessary to make that choice possible. In a society that really respected women, unwanted and unexpected pregnancy would be rare, because men who had sex with women would understand that sex often results in babies and they would either accept the responsibility that this implies, or they'd keep their pants zipped. In a society that really valued women and their awesome reproductive capacity, rape and incest would be rare, because every boy would be taught from childhood to treat girls with respect, and girls would never see their fathers leering at NFL cheerleaders or Hooters waitresses or Sports Illustrated swimsuit models or Playboy centerfolds and would thus never internalize the idea that girls are supposed to grow up and become sexual playthings for men and boys.

That's a long paragraph, right?

*****
Abortion is an appalling offense against the dignity of women and the dignity of all human life. But it's not the only one. So you know what, Alabama? And Georgia and Louisiana and Missouri and all of you other states that are so eager to establish a new vanguard of pro-life extremism? Figure out how to fix all of that. Figure out how to make it so that unwanted pregnancy is rare, and that families and children are so valued that women won't think twice about bringing life into the world. Because unless your proclaimed commitment to the sanctity of life is backed up by something other than take-that-Planned-Parenthood abortion laws, then all of the women wearing pussy hats and Handmaid garb and "Keep Your Laws off My Body" t-shirts will keep calling you woman-haters and tyrants and a new American Taliban. And you know what else? They won't be wrong.

And I will scoff--SCOFF, I tell you--every time you proclaim yourselves to be "pro-life."

You keep saying that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

*Title and last paragraph: William Goldman, "The Princess Bride"

The Baby and the Bathwater

It's two months post-Weinstein now, and everyone seems to have came to a sort of simultaneous mass agreement to enforce zero tolerance on sexual harassment or misconduct. All of a sudden, any man (well, ALMOST any man) who has ever behaved or spoken inappropriately has to be punished, severely and possibly permanently. 

Like lots of other #metoo women, I have mixed feelings about this. Weinstein deserves his comeuppance (the word of the moment), and so do lots of other prominent men. With super high-profile people like Weinstein and Matt Lauer, the worst offense is not so much the wildly inappropriate or even illegal sexual behavior; it's the gross abuse of power. In those cases, the public downfall is more than deserved. (And it should have happened to Donald Trump. And it should have happened to Bill Clinton. And it's not too late.)

But there's the baby and there's the bathwater. I would like to drain the dirty bathwater, and then thoroughly scrub the tub, but I don't want to discard the baby. I like the baby. I like a lot of men who might, at some point during their personal or professional lives, have said or done something offensive or stupid. In fact, I love some of those men, and I don't want to see them--my friends, or my brothers, or my cousins, or my colleagues might be among them--cast into outer darkness forever. Should we judge the behavior of twenty or even five years ago by the standard of today? Because if so, then who among us will stand up to scrutiny? 

On the other hand (there's always another hand, isn't there? It's why we have two) I have extremely limited patience with the men who are now crying that they just don't know where the line is anymore. They just don't know how to behave! They don't know what they're allowed to do or say! Because it's not that hard. If you're not intimately involved with a woman, then she does not want you to touch most parts of her body. If you work with women, then they do not want to see naked pictures of you or anyone else, and they don't want to talk about sex, either. Because it's work. See? Pretty easy. 

The larger implications of this whole thing are just beginning to become clear. Or at least one specific thing is clear, and that's that the sex-soaked culture of the last 50 years, in which every aspect of entertainment, art, sports, music, politics, and pretty much every other field of human endeavor is permeated and dominated by sex, will have to change. If we're going to hold men (and women, of course) accountable for maintaining a level of decorum that excludes recreational sexual aggression, then we probably can't shove near-naked bodies in people's faces 24 hours a day anymore. 

On its own, that's a good thing. Even if I wasn't a Catholic, I wouldn't actually want to see sex scenes in every movie. I'm disgusted and bored by crude sexual humor on the radio and on TV. I cringe when I hear the lyrics of some of my children's favorite songs. I'm tired of seeing so-called cheerleaders dressed like pole dancers.* 

But the baby is still in the dirty bathwater, isn't he? Bari Weiss** said something about revolutions taking on a life of their own, quickly swallowing everyone in their path, devouring the guilty, the innocent, and the indifferent bystanders, and it's not unlikely that this revolution will have unintended consequences. Ideally, the culture will shift toward an idea of sexuality that acknowledges and respects human dignity. But if you have been on this blog for more than five minutes, then you know that I never expect the ideal outcome. The worst case scenario is my default option. I even have a tag. 

And what's the worst-case scenario? There are any number, but the one that I can see rising to the top is a new Puritanism that combines the very worst of radical feminist hatred of men and radical religious hatred of women, in a country so divided that you won't be sure which standard prevails from one county to the next. In this scenario, Roy Moore wins in Alabama and ten years later, he's part of the moderate wing of whatever new party replaces the Republican party; the moderate wing being the one that believes that a man should only beat the women he's related to, and that a man shouldn't marry a 14-year-old girl without her father's permission. Meanwhile, in what we now call the blue states, men will be fined or arrested for smiling at women they're not married to, and state-financed abortion up to forty weeks will be a basic civil right. 

Or maybe the whole thing will blow over, and everything will be back to normal, whatever that is, in six months. I don't think so, though. I think that a hard rain is going to fall. I think there's going to be a sea change. I'm praying that it's the right one. 

*****

*That's not so much an attack on NFL cheerleaders as a defense of pole dancers. Why should we consider a stripper a social undesirable; while NFL cheerleaders, who dress and behave in the same manner, are held up as examples of wholesome young womanhood? 

**By the way, I agree with a lot of Ms. Weiss's column, but I've never heard anyone say "Believe all women." There's a huge difference between "Believe women" and "Believe all women," always and everywhere, just because they're women. It's the baby and the bathwater again. Don't throw away the very reasonable "Believe women" because it sounds almost like "Believe ALL women." They are two different things. 

Commentary and review

I never intended for this to become a book review blog, but I tend to write about what I do, and in the winter, I read.  Well, I also complain about the cold and contrive to find ways to avoid taking my clothes off and/or going outside, but those things don't make for compelling content.  So it's books for now.

*****

Books and current events, actually.  Right now, half a million women, give or take, are marching on Washington, just a few miles away from the couch where I sit with my laptop.  I sympathize with their cause, mostly, but the organizers of the march made clear that they don't want pro-life women anywhere near their protest, so I didn't go.  Just as well.  My son had a swim meet today, so I held a clipboard instead of a sign.  Now I'm back home and about to return to my book: Rumer Godden's In This House of Brede.

Every so often, I'll hear someone mention a book that I've never heard of, and I'll be curious about it.  Then someone else, in a completely different context, will mention the same book, and I'll think about how odd that is, that twice in a day or so, I'm hearing two different people praise the same relatively obscure book.  When I then see or hear a third mention of that same book, I consider critical mass to have been reached, and I immediately buy the book.

*****

Total non sequitur alert: I just watched Sean Spicer's first press room briefing.  That was the type of performance for which the phrase "I can't even" was invented. No words.

*****

OK, maybe a few words.  Was it completely unexpected that the Trump administration's very first concern was not how to reunite this very divided country, nor how to create jobs for the working-class voters who supported the new President, nor how to defeat ISIS or address any of the myriad threats to national security?  Was it any surprise that on their very first full day in the White House, the Trump administration's very first message to the country was a petty, whining little complaint about the media's supposed misrepresentation of the allegedly huge crowds at yesterday's Inaugural events? Does Donald Trump ever do anything other than cry like a big orange baby?

*****
Anyway.  Back to This House of Brede.  It is, appropriately for today, a book about a group of women; specifically, Benedictine nuns in post-war England. The protagonist is a successful Oxford-educated professional woman who at age 40 or so abandons her high position in a government agency and joins the Benedictines as a novice.  Although the action, such as it is, all occurs inside a quiet and isolated religious cloister, it's still page-turningly gripping.  Like all great novels, Brede creates a completely self-contained world like no other, but still completely recognizable.  I recommend it.

*****

Because I like to suffer, and Lent is still months away, I decided to take an online HTML class. It's still too soon.  I graduated in 2014, but I find that I'm still all full up with book learning and can't do with any more just now, so no more HTML class.  I'll just wing it.  That approach usually works really well.

*****

Books, politics, and incompetent coding.  If you were looking for sharply focused thought neatly distilled in spare and concise prose, then you came to the wrong place. Live and learn.

Party politics

We have a party every year, on the night before Thanksgiving. It's not even a party, really, more of a get-together. Food and drinks and a fire bowl and music, and people coming and going, and most of us talking about how we can't believe that the holidays are upon us, and that soon enough, we'll be saying that we can't believe that it's summer already.

I have friends whose beliefs span the whole political spectrum, so if nothing else, then I guess that the conversation at this year's party might be a little more lively than usual. I'm wondering if I need to post "No Politics" signs around the house that night, just to keep things from getting out of hand.

My Trump-supporting friends voted for him either because they had such serious reservations about Hillary that they felt that they had no choice, or because the Democratic party is anathema to their pro-life beliefs.  I sympathize with their concerns about Hillary Clinton; and as a pro-life person, I also share their dislike of the Democratic party.  

HOWEVER:

1. The Republicans are no better. They controlled the House, the Senate, and the White House from 2001 to 2007, and what they accomplished on the abortion issue can be filed under N for not a damn thing.  They’ll have full control of the Executive and Legislative branches again beginning in January, making it put up or shut up time for the GOP.  Personally, I no longer believe that politics is the way to approach this (or most other issues), which is why I don’t worry much about party affiliation when I vote.  The idea of abortion as a human right is a monstrous lie, and unless we can change the culture and help people to see the truth about abortion, then no lawmaker or judge can make even the slightest difference.  What does make a difference is a genuine understanding of the dignity and worth of every single human life, and that makes it hard for me to understand how people believe that Donald Trump is the person to advance the cause, but I suppose we'll see.
2. Yes, friends who voted for Trump, I will concede that he has been gracious in victory.  I’ll also point out that it’s very very easy to be gracious in victory.  Graciousness in defeat is a whole other thing, and nothing that Mr. Trump has said or done suggests that he’s even remotely capable of losing with dignity.  I have no plans to demonstrate on the streets to protest the results of a fairly contested election.  Democracy is a bitch sometimes.  But please don’t make me laugh with ridiculous assertions that Trump supporters wouldn’t have done the exact same thing if he hadn’t won.  Trump would have cried like a big orange baby about rigged systems and biased liberal media, and angry Trump supporters would be demanding recounts and threatening revolt or civil war or worse.  Spare me.
3. The draining of the swamp appears to be underway.  News reports suggest that Trump’s cabinet picks will include Rudy Giuliani as Attorney General,  Newt Gingrich as Secretary of State, Sen. Jeff Sessions as Secretary of Defense, and a retired Goldman Sachs executive as Secretary of the Treasury.  Maybe the President-elect forgot to mention that he was planning to replace the swamp with a cesspool.  P.S. You keep saying "Blind Trust." I do not think that this means what you think it means.

ON THE OTHER HAND:

1. To anyone who has posted or shared the horrible meme of four or five former First Ladies in dignified and regal attire, juxtaposed with a nude shot of poor Melania Trump, which was probably taken under duress when she was 18 or 19 years old: Have the rules on “slut-shaming” changed?  Is it now OK to slut-shame, as long as the slut in question is affiliated with the wrong political party, or married to the wrong man?  Talk among yourselves and get back to me on that.  Meanwhile, if you share or post that meme or anything like it, for the purpose of shaming or degrading Melania Trump for her youthful indiscretions, then I will immediately recognize you for the misogynist that you are, and I will decline to take anything you say seriously, ever again.  
2. If you’re calling for Democrats and other Trump-resisters to treat Trump with exactly the same obstructionism and lack of respect that Republicans heaped on Barack Obama, then just stop it with the Michelle Obama “they go low and we go high” quotes.  That’s exactly the opposite of “going high.”
3. Not everyone who voted for Trump is a racist or a hateful hating hater filled with hatred. The "Love Trumps Hate" rhetoric is just silliness. And by the way, "hate" is a verb. It should be "Love Trumps Hatred." I get that the former sounds better. But it's just wrong.

See how fair that is? Three each. Now enough of the politics. It's party time.

Nothing to see here...

If you ask the Washington Post or NBC News, then this didn't happen.

Interesting.

Is it not news because it happened in a foreign country?  Because I'm guessing, just guessing, that if the pro-life demonstrators had sexually assaulted the pro-choicers, in public, then it would have been worldwide headline news no matter where it occurred.

I'm sure, though, that Gloria Steinem, and Cecile Richards, and Terry O'Neill, and Nancy Pelosi, and Barbara Boxer, and Debbie Wasserman Schultz are all going to issue statements condemning this hideously violent attack against religious and free-speech rights, and asserting that their cause is not helped by such behavior.  Maybe they already have!  Yes, I'm sure that's it.

Or not.

Even Planned Parenthood GLOBAL (because maybe Planned Parenthood US feels that it's just none of their business, right?) has absolutely nothing to say about this.  So if they're not morally outraged, it doesn't occur to them to think that perhaps public, violent, obscene attacks on pro-lifers will not win converts; that if someone is on the fence on abortion (as I once was), then the sight of abortion supporters attacking peaceful pro-life protesters might just lead these fence-sitters to decide that they'd rather not be on the side of the people who publicly sexually assault their opponents? And spare me any suggestion that a woman rubbing her bare breasts in a strange man's face, or spray-painting his genitals, is not sexually assaulting him.  If the spray paint can belonged to a man and the crotch belonged to a woman, we'd all be clear on the definition of sexual assault.

I used to believe that abortion should be legal, although I never referred to myself as pro-choice because I have never felt that it was a legitimate choice (and among the women I personally know who have had abortions, most of them say that they didn't feel that they had any choice). I have many friends on both sides of this issue.  And I KNOW that pro-lifers have behaved very badly indeed in some cases.  How do I know this?  Not from personal eyewitness, nor from word of mouth, but because when a pro-life protester assaults a pro-choicer, it's NEWS, and rightly so.

I'm going to wait and see.  The national media took a long damn time to say anything at all about Dr. Gosnell, but they finally did, because they finally had to.  I'm the most obscure blogger in the world right now, but fortunately, I'm not the only one writing about this.  Maybe some actual paid professional journalists will eventually decide that this is news after all.